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So I finally got around to reading this, and I must say, I was left very unimpressed. For months people kept telling me how amazeballs this book was and how deep the story was.

Well, imagine my surprise when I discovered nothing impressive at all. Just more of that modern secular "hurr durr religion bad, science and technology good" nonsense that permeates 70% of modern science fiction writing. Lots of sanctimonious drivel about "X have killed more people than Y" arguments that remind me of the silly "my dad has more money than your dad" arguments one might encounter on a first grade playground. Uriah Olathaire is a much, much deeper character than I thought he would be, and the whole "end" of the story where the emperor just "reveals himself" to Uriah and all of a sudden he wants to follow him without question was beautifully ironic. Never mind the Emperor just blatantly destroying 1000's of years of history, and a work of art that even he himself admitted was one born out of human genius and passion.

Is all the writing for the Emperor just terrible in this IP? Or are their actually some decent books about him and his views, because so far I just laugh at the entire concept of the EoM. He's a terribly written character!

Did anyone else think this work was just a mash of common atheist talking points? I mean, I really didn't think that any of the Emperor's arguments did much to challenge the religious nature of Uriah Olathaire, and in fact I thought they were the more weaker arguments that exist in the religious debates commonly found in our real world.

 Togusa wrote:
So I finally got around to reading this, and I must say, I was left very unimpressed. For months people kept telling me how amazeballs this book was and how deep the story was.

Well, imagine my surprise when I discovered nothing impressive at all. Just more of that modern secular "hurr durr religion bad, science and technology good" nonsense that permeates 70% of modern science fiction writing. Lots of sanctimonious drivel about "X have killed more people than Y" arguments that remind me of the silly "my dad has more money than your dad" arguments one might encounter on a first grade playground. Uriah Olathaire is a much, much deeper character than I thought he would be, and the whole "end" of the story where the emperor just "reveals himself" to Uriah and all of a sudden he wants to follow him without question was beautifully ironic. Never mind the Emperor just blatantly destroying 1000's of years of history, and a work of art that even he himself admitted was one born out of human genius and passion.

Is all the writing for the Emperor just terrible in this IP? Or are their actually some decent books about him and his views, because so far I just laugh at the entire concept of the EoM. He's a terribly written character!

Did anyone else think this work was just a mash of common atheist talking points? I mean, I really didn't think that any of the Emperor's arguments did much to challenge the religious nature of Uriah Olathaire, and in fact I thought they were the more weaker arguments that exist in the religious debates commonly found in our real world.

Did you really expect some great philosophical insight from a warhammer book? It's a pop sci-fi writer adding some substance to a bolter porn universe. You're not going to find a PhD thesis repudiating religion in there.

bogalubov wrote:

 Togusa wrote:
So I finally got around to reading this, and I must say, I was left very unimpressed. For months people kept telling me how amazeballs this book was and how deep the story was.

Well, imagine my surprise when I discovered nothing impressive at all. Just more of that modern secular "hurr durr religion bad, science and technology good" nonsense that permeates 70% of modern science fiction writing. Lots of sanctimonious drivel about "X have killed more people than Y" arguments that remind me of the silly "my dad has more money than your dad" arguments one might encounter on a first grade playground. Uriah Olathaire is a much, much deeper character than I thought he would be, and the whole "end" of the story where the emperor just "reveals himself" to Uriah and all of a sudden he wants to follow him without question was beautifully ironic. Never mind the Emperor just blatantly destroying 1000's of years of history, and a work of art that even he himself admitted was one born out of human genius and passion.

Is all the writing for the Emperor just terrible in this IP? Or are their actually some decent books about him and his views, because so far I just laugh at the entire concept of the EoM. He's a terribly written character!

Did anyone else think this work was just a mash of common atheist talking points? I mean, I really didn't think that any of the Emperor's arguments did much to challenge the religious nature of Uriah Olathaire, and in fact I thought they were the more weaker arguments that exist in the religious debates commonly found in our real world.

Did you really expect some great philosophical insight from a warhammer book? It's a pop sci-fi writer adding some substance to a bolter porn universe. You're not going to find a PhD thesis repudiating religion in there.

Granted. I was just hoping for something more, honestly I was hoping it would be a stalemate. The emperor would burn down the church, and Uriah would walk off into the wilderness and live as the last believer until his eventual death.

I dunno what people told you, but one of the reasons it is so lauded and considered an interesting read/listen is because it is a tangible bridge between our world and 40k's one.

We have a very real religion of our own world (it is never said, but it's strongly implied to be the Catholic church IIRC. Also of interesting note, how one of our own religions has survived intact that far into the future) interacting with a fictitious atheist tyrant and the interesting story you can make from it.

That's where the "The Last Church is a good read" comes from. That's exactly how it was sold to me

 Grimtuff wrote:
I dunno what people told you, but one of the reasons it is so lauded and considered an interesting read/listen is because it is a tangible bridge between our world and 40k's one.

We have a very real religion of our own world (it is never said, but it's strongly implied to be the Catholic church IIRC. Also of interesting note, how one of our own religions has survived intact that far into the future) interacting with a fictitious atheist tyrant and the interesting story you can make from it.

That's where the "The Last Church is a good read" comes from. That's exactly how it was sold to me

I can sort of see what you're saying. It definitely paints Uriah as the last true human martyr of the old world. He seems to represent the death of belief, yet he doesn't. Belief in the emperor is still a thing.

I think the irony is the point. Like the whole, 'Don't worship me, I'm not a God' stuff which sparks a rebellion which ends in him being worshipped as a God. Warhammer is about as subtle as a sledge but it comes from the same 80s birthing pool as Judge Dredd, Robocop etc etc. Orwell, it ain't but it does make some worthwhile points.

 Togusa wrote:

Granted. I was just hoping for something more, honestly I was hoping it would be a stalemate. The emperor would burn down the church, and Uriah would walk off into the wilderness and live as the last believer until his eventual death.

A stalemate? The guy murders trillions of humans who successfully survived the Old Night simply because they don't agree with how to proceed and deal with the future. The Emperor does not do stalemate. One of the more interesting developments of the Heresy is that the idea of unity and logic triumphing over religion is that it's all a lie. The Emperor wants to obliterate the old ways not because he's sure that it's false, but because he knows how powerful it is. He doesn't do it with well crafted words, he does it with genetically engineered murder machines. The iterators come through to steer the thoughts of the survivors.

 Togusa wrote:
Just more of that modern secular "hurr durr religion bad, science and technology good" nonsense that permeates 70% of modern science fiction writing.

I'm sorry you are annoyed that most science fiction recognize religion for what it is. I'll pray for your soul .

I think it did a good job of showing that the Emperor was a huge hypocrite and that as much as he loved humanity as an idea, he was really bad with people. He preached constantly that science and reason was the pinnacle of human achievements and that there were no gods and religion was more trouble than it was worth.

But even before accending to the throne he essentially expected people to have unblinking faith in him and his dream. He kept a lot of secrets from even his closets commanders, routinely took no actions to explain his own choices, and generally felt that people should blindly obey him. That kinda sounds a lot like a religion, or at least a shallow parody of one, 40k isn't the deepest of setting.

Intreasting thing is the Emperor seemed to think one day he'd be unneeded. IMHO Malcador was right, humanity would ALWAYS need him, mostly because he didn't seem intreasted in grooming sucessors

I find that if something gets a lot of hype, that whenever I get around to watching, reading, or listening to it, it doesn't have a hope of meeting my expectations. Game of Thrones didn't do much for me and I expected a lot more hats on the ground. I thought Hereditary was a finely made film but the story wasn't really original save for actually showing one thing. They aren't bad but they can't live up to what I was expecting based on a lot of people saying it's awesome.

I've always liked the idea that the Emperor was really trying to become the next Chaos God. In order to do that, he needed to eliminate other human religions for a psychic link that wasn't getting muddled by people confusing things he did with those of Jesus, Mohammad, Vishnu, etc. Yes, he was preaching the Imperial Truth, but with what he was doing and his abilities he knew that it was only a matter of time before people started thinking he was a god. He'd just look humble by saying he wasn't.a god.

Its a great story, infamous as helk.

I like the discussion, how Revelation was just so secular and caught in his ways that he couldn't really think straight. He was like the opposite of a religious bigot, an atheist bigot. While I agreed with the Priest in some cases, Revelation did bring up great points.

I believe it was meant to imply at the end that even with all the debate, and the reveal that everything this guy did was a ripple of the Emperor's actions, and where Uriah lost his faith, the true triumph was that he then found it again, as some things are stronger than the laws of one man. I read somewhere, I believe from McNeill himself, that intended it to be something that sort of tied both ways, and while the Emperor may have been able to out debate him in a war of words, he was still a violent tyrant and a hypocrite, while Uriah won the war of spirituality and morality.

However whether or not this was the intention, all the book really managed to portray was making Uriah look like a fanatical idiot who was literally willing to set himself alight for his ideals and was completely unwilling to take a step back even for a second, even with the direct reveal of the knowledge that everything he believed in was literally the guy standing in front of him, who was then telling him it's wrong.

Which, is probably the best set-up for the 40k universe I can think of.






All in all, I think the book was great though. AMAZING in audiobook form. Excellent piece of the setting. It's not the work of a philosopher. I actually think the concepts it touched on really weren't that bad at all for a Sci-Fi book, and there's a lot of pseudo-intellectualism that gets waved around about how the book isn't clever enough for them.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Asherian Command wrote:
Its a great story, infamous as helk.

I like the discussion, how Revelation was just so secular and caught in his ways that he couldn't really think straight. He was like the opposite of a religious bigot, an atheist bigot. While I agreed with the Priest in some cases, Revelation did bring up great points.

I think the story had the intended impact on you then, I think this is how it was ideally written to come across.

The story is great. Everyone steps away with a different takeaway from it.

I think the main flaw with the story was the author..... Mr McNeil isn't the 'best' BL author. The story was a good idea but if people really thought there was going to be more then " I'm the Empz, I tell people I've been around for a while and I've seen all the horrible things religion does so really really believe me when I say religion is bad...I'm the Empz, religion is bad....look at all these horrible things done in the name of religion..." in a BL book then well....

I personally liked it. It wasn't the most well written of arguments on either side but it has its charm to it like when they are drinking the grog then Uriah brings out the good stuff. I really enjoyed that part. Also the video of " if the emps had a TTSD" where Uriah comes back to rub it all in his face was rather amusing.

The story itself wasn't exactly brilliant, but I don't think that's why people like it so much. I like it because of what it reveals about the Emperor. There are hints in there that the Emperor simply doesn't and never can understand certain aspects of humanity, like faith, and possibly hope. Then you have the continued exploration of how hypocritical he is which, intentional or not, is rapidly becoming a defining characteristic of the Emperor.

Personally I like the story simply because it represents a total and utter failure on the author's point. For those unaware, McNeil is a heavy duty fedora tipper that makes even me feel shameful by association. He's a full on Dawkins fan and wrote the Last Church from the position that the Emperor is supposed to be correct in his argument. Instead due to poor writing, the Emperor's position looks utterly unfounded and historically incorrect, with him coming off as just another Napoleon with the priest being in the right.

It's a good example of when an author screws up so much that his intended soapbox turns against himself.

I think some of the criticism of this is a little unfair.
This is a SHORT story that tries to cover a lot of topics. It doesn't have the page or word count of Master of Mankind (which i didn't enjoy because it felt disjointed, despite being a Custodes fan and staunch loyalist! - but that's perhaps because i read in short sections and that might have broken the flow of the novel) The Emperors arguments aren't perhaps the greatest, I'll admit. But how much of that is down to Graeme's personal beliefs, or the fact that he's only got so many words/pages to use, or that the Emperor is so far beyond humanity that he isn't equipped to have this discussion with Uriah, or perhaps its because Emp knows that, deep down, Uriah is right and there are gods?
Though, I guess we will all have different opinions on this.
(the beauty of Literature)
I like it because it adds some humanity into 30k. The simple act of sitting and having a drink. The attempt at reconciliation. The blindness of faith. While there is a part of many of us that wants to be that Space Marine gunning down traitors/xenos, this felt a little more 'real'. I can see me sitting in a bar/cafe/church etc and overhearing this conversation.

Some of the offense on this one seems to be forgetting some keys of 40k. We aren't talking someone who's trying to dethrone the christian god or some such, we're talking someone who's attempting to defeat the gods of chaos and their designs for humanity. The militant atheism is pretty on brand at that point I'd assume. The irony of it is supposed to be the fact that the militant atheist is clearly blinded by his own faith to the destruction he's wreaking, or worse, simple apathy due to his own arrogance. It sets him up as a clearly impersonal leader who believes he has the one true way to do things. Which I'd like to think most people realize is a wonderfully bad idea. Meanwhile a lot of the GrimDark of 40k comes from the idea that he may in fact have been correct, or the powers played him like a fiddle, with these results no one can really tell.

It fits in the background of 40k just fine and definitely hit the tone for Emps that I expected. I'm still lost as to why anyone expected him to be a good person, he's just immensely powerful and has imposed his way on humanity. I don't expect a philosopher when I hear those things.

 Wyzilla wrote:
McNeil is a heavy duty fedora tipper

I presume this has a meaning, but would you like to explain it? It sounds like one of those loaded "dog whistle" phrases that get thrown around, but this is a new one on me.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:
McNeil is a heavy duty fedora tipper

I presume this has a meaning, but would you like to explain it? It sounds like one of those loaded "dog whistle" phrases that get thrown around, but this is a new one on me.

You pretty much got it. The guy probably said something Wyzilla disagreed with once, so now he's forever tarnished in his mind and branded with some hyperbolic catchphrase, in this case one meaning neckbeard.

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/tips-fedora

Ah. we're back to the Topic That Shall Not Be Discussed, I see.

I did recognise a lot of The last Church from The God Delusion, but unlike Wyzilla, I don't see that as a problem.

(Although I do appreciate the irony of using an internet "meme" in the same post as one mentioning Richard Dawkins )

To be fair, Dawkins is probably the last atheist you should listen to as he isn't a talented philosopher.

 SHUPPET wrote:

The story is great. Everyone steps away with a different takeaway from it.

I'm puzzled by the idea that this is praise for an author or work (though I have no real idea if its true for this particular one).
If every reader comes away with a different message, the author completely failed to convey anything at all.

Voss wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:

The story is great. Everyone steps away with a different takeaway from it.

I'm puzzled by the idea that this is praise for an author or work (though I have no real idea if its true for this particular one).
If every reader comes away with a different message, the author completely failed to convey anything at all.

That would depend entirely on what you think art and literature should be about.

As far as 40k is concerned, I think it's amazing to have a story where the Emperor (admittedly the main character of the entire universe) ends up being an ambiguous and divisive figure, especially within the context of a series about the Horus Heresy.

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 Togusa wrote:
Just more of that modern secular "hurr durr religion bad, science and technology good" nonsense that permeates 70% of modern science fiction writing.

I'm sorry you are annoyed that most science fiction recognize religion for what it is. I'll pray for your soul .

I too found the Last Church to be a bit disappointing. The Emperor's arguments against religion were so silly I had no problem refuting them, and neither should have had a supposedly wise religious guy like Uriah. But yeah, it is a Warhammer novel, so don't expect anything super deep in it. I think the reason why so many people like the Last Church is not because it is deep or anything, but rather because it gives us a really interesting look in the distant past of the 40k universe and a pivotal moment in the history of the Emperor and what would become the Imperium of Man. That is why I liked it.

 Wyzilla wrote:
Personally I like the story simply because it represents a total and utter failure on the author's point. For those unaware, McNeil is a heavy duty fedora tipper that makes even me feel shameful by association. He's a full on Dawkins fan and wrote the Last Church from the position that the Emperor is supposed to be correct in his argument. Instead due to poor writing, the Emperor's position looks utterly unfounded and historically incorrect, with him coming off as just another Napoleon with the priest being in the right.

It's a good example of when an author screws up so much that his intended soapbox turns against himself.

Ah! Now this makes more sense to me. I hadn't a clue who Gram was because I usually don't pay attention to author names. I agree, the Emperor just kept coming across as a tool, time after time in this story. I nearly spit out my drink when I heard the line " Politics has killed it's thousands, of course, but religion has killed its millions." I guess he just completely forgot about Lenin, Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, Saddam, Ho Chi Min, American Expansionism and Manifest Destiny, Colonization of Africa, all politically motivated, and not exclusively the actions of pure religious fervor.

Yeah, by the end of the story, I was ready to walk right back into that church with Uriah.

You know, honestly I keep going over and over this in my mind, but the whole 40K story would be a lot more interesting if Big E, the Primarchs, and the Marines didn't exist at all.

Just man, alone in a sea of stars surrounded by aliens, deamons, and the like.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 Togusa wrote:
Just more of that modern secular "hurr durr religion bad, science and technology good" nonsense that permeates 70% of modern science fiction writing.

I'm sorry you are annoyed that most science fiction recognize religion for what it is. I'll pray for your soul .

I too found the Last Church to be a bit disappointing. The Emperor's arguments against religion were so silly I had no problem refuting them, and neither should have had a supposedly wise religious guy like Uriah. But yeah, it is a Warhammer novel, so don't expect anything super deep in it. I think the reason why so many people like the Last Church is not because it is deep or anything, but rather because it gives us a really interesting look in the distant past of the 40k universe and a pivotal moment in the history of the Emperor and what would become the Imperium of Man. That is why I liked it.

Oddly the bait just proves my point. "hurr durr religion bad, everything else good!" Remember when Uriah even calls out the emperor for allowing his brutes to show no mercy to the soldiers at Cadua. He was no better than those crusaders he spent a whole paragraph crying about early in the story.

Then there is this gem:

"Nothing of such grand scale can be achieved without a singular vision at its heart, least of all the reconquest of the Galaxy."
"Didn't you just tell me of the bloody slaughters perpetrated by crusaders? Doesn’t that make you no better than the holy men you were telling me about?"
"The difference is I know I am right," said the Emperor.

Yeah, he was sure right!

Moving on:

"Spoken like a true autocrat."
"You misunderstand, Uriah. I have seen the narrow survival path that is all that stands between humanity and extinction, and this is the way it must begin."

Who is to say that there is only one path? This flies in the face of the Emperors science based logic, destiny is fictitious, so there should be infinitely many paths for humanity to follow.

"It is a dangerous road you travel. To deny humanity a thing will only make them crave it all the more.

Lorgar. Check.

And if you succeed in this grand vision of yours? What then? Beware that your subjects do not begin to see you as a god."

Nah, that couldn't...wait a minute. He saw the path, yet he couldn't foresee Horus, Lorgar and the emo gang throwing a hissy-fit?

A being who truly believed that his absolute vision of the future was just and right.

So, the Emperor was as much a faithful as Uriah. Good to know!

Now, that part I agree with. I would like to see more stories from this time period. The massive cultural, sociological and religious changes of the time are and would be fascinating to read about. See how the emperor interacted with other warlords and the like.

 rippounet wrote:

Voss wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:

The story is great. Everyone steps away with a different takeaway from it.

I'm puzzled by the idea that this is praise for an author or work (though I have no real idea if its true for this particular one).
If every reader comes away with a different message, the author completely failed to convey anything at all.

That would depend entirely on what you think art and literature should be about.

Conveying a message, though it is not always what the author thinks it is. Not equally conveying all messages. Up is down, left is right and backwards is forwards means you've presented gibberish.

As far as 40k is concerned, I think it's amazing to have a story where the Emperor (admittedly the main character of the entire universe) ends up being an ambiguous and divisive figure, especially within the context of a series about the Horus Heresy.

Eh. That seems normal for every HH book I've read. He's the very essence of an ambiguous background detail, and the divisiveness of his existence is in fact the point of the series.

Though the Emperor as main character seems categorically untrue. He isn't present as a character for most of it, just an overwhelming but passive force to be acted for or against. There isn't any suggestion of growth, learning or even often of action or decisions on the Emperors part, even on some of the major events. Nikea, for example, gets presented as a superstitious fiction he's tolerating, not putting in motion personally, in essence sacrificing Magnus to the mob, because too many of his followers are too ignorant to understand the truth.

Voss wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:

The story is great. Everyone steps away with a different takeaway from it.

I'm puzzled by the idea that this is praise for an author or work (though I have no real idea if its true for this particular one).
If every reader comes away with a different message, the author completely failed to convey anything at all.

Unless the intention was to portray a debate over a complex issue, and it was done well enough that it leaves the reader's predispositions as the factor that shape the outcome of the story. And being that I'm pretty sure he stated something along the lines of this as his goal, and it was up to the reader to judge who came out of it looking better, I'd say he did quite well.

There's a lot of people who read this and think The Emperor looked like a brutish hypocrite by the end.

There's a lot of people who think Uriah looked like a radical zealot who would rather light himself on fire than accept reality, even with the "god" he knew, staring him in the face and telling him he was wrong.

There's a lot of people who see some sort of shade of both.



I think at the very least, I think McNeill achieved that goal with his book. Hence threads like this.

 Togusa wrote:


Oddly the bait just proves my point. "hurr durr religion bad, everything else good!" Remember when Uriah even calls out the emperor for allowing his brutes to show no mercy to the soldiers at Cadua. He was no better than those crusaders he spent a whole paragraph crying about early in the story.

Then there is this gem:

"Nothing of such grand scale can be achieved without a singular vision at its heart, least of all the reconquest of the Galaxy."
"Didn't you just tell me of the bloody slaughters perpetrated by crusaders? Doesn’t that make you no better than the holy men you were telling me about?"
"The difference is I know I am right," said the Emperor.

Yeah, he was sure right!

Moving on:

"Spoken like a true autocrat."
"You misunderstand, Uriah. I have seen the narrow survival path that is all that stands between humanity and extinction, and this is the way it must begin."

Who is to say that there is only one path? This flies in the face of the Emperors science based logic, destiny is fictitious, so there should be infinitely many paths for humanity to follow.

"It is a dangerous road you travel. To deny humanity a thing will only make them crave it all the more.

Lorgar. Check.

And if you succeed in this grand vision of yours? What then? Beware that your subjects do not begin to see you as a god."

Nah, that couldn't...wait a minute. He saw the path, yet he couldn't foresee Horus, Lorgar and the emo gang throwing a hissy-fit?

A being who truly believed that his absolute vision of the future was just and right.

So, the Emperor was as much a faithful as Uriah. Good to know!

I think this is the point man. He's not meant to be portrayed as being the unfallibly right guy in this story. You've found the same holes in his argument that McNeill put there. Uriah even them out.

 Togusa wrote:

Nah, that couldn't...wait a minute. He saw the path, yet he couldn't foresee Horus, Lorgar and the emo gang throwing a hissy-fit?

Who says he didn't? When you are making sure something happens you kinda forsee it ;-) They wouldn't be starting rebellion if they were happy now would they?

Something I really liked about the Master of Mankind was how the Emperor discussed how daemons speak English (Gothic, whatever), in that it's a cheap psychic trick of reflecting back on someone whatever they want or don't want to see. The Emperor seems to use a similar trick with people, a kind of psychic Rorschach cloak, so he seems to know what he's talking about.

Maybe that's why he seems he has so many disparate personalities and motivations, because it's a crutch he relies on to get people organized and aligned with his goals, so they see whatever they need to see/hear to get them on board.

So a lone religious holdout would see weak intellectual arguments against something non-cognitive or intellectual, his faith. So while the Emperor came overcome small differences or fiddly details of organization, he can't overcome the psychic shield that faith provides. Hence his extermination of the religious, because he can't co-opt them.

That it creates the opportunity for an Imperial cult is the kind of irony I think we all like in 40k.